


Holidays with the Hales

by ohanotherday



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Pre Hale Fire, Pre-Canon, Teen!Peter, bb!Derek
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-19
Updated: 2012-12-19
Packaged: 2017-11-21 12:39:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/597859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohanotherday/pseuds/ohanotherday
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Peter didn't come home from college in order to take care of all his younger siblings and cousins. If he could be left alone for maybe two minutes, that would be <i>great</i>. But that was impossible as long as he was the youngest uncle. Kids just somehow thought they belonged in his space. They were just always there: on his lap, hanging from his shoulders, pulling on his hands to lead him somewhere. If someone could explain when it was decided that he would be a full-time babysitter during his winter break, it would be much appreciated.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Holidays with the Hales

**Author's Note:**

> I never felt the desire to write Peter into my bb!Derek story "Where Clouds Roll By," but this has him in it. But it's actually more of a flashback/pre-canon scene instead of actually being part of that story, and the Peter in this story is the teen/young adult version played by Michael Fjordbak. I don't know, vacations from college always turn into me babysitting relatives, but it made me wonder if Peter ever had that experience. His family was probably pretty big and close-knit, so I thought it was possible. Also, I've decided I don’t understand kid logic after babysitting my niece so much, but it still made me want to write a story with bb!Derek again.

Peter pulled the pink covers over his head. He could hear little feet padding over the wood floors, and dread pooled in his stomach when he realized the footsteps were heading for the room he was in. He had wrangled the kids into their beds last night, but one of them was obviously misbehaving. Peter checked his watch, groaning when he saw that his watch read 1:14 am. The door creaked open, and as soon as the child was in the room, they shut the door once more. Peter wasn't fully awake, but after a moment, he could tell it was Derek.

"Peter," Derek whispered.

Peter pulled the covers off his head to shush the toddler. Laura and Jessica had barely stopped giggling on the top bunk, and he didn't want them waking up from their slumber. However, Derek took that as an invitation and he ambled over, gait mixed somewhere between furtive and wobbly.

"Can I-can I sleep here?"

Peter shook his head. He was already sharing the bed with about fifty stuffed animals. "No," Peter replied.

"Please?" Derek whined. "Please, please, please?" The toddler stood next to Peter's face. When Peter didn't say anything, Derek pressed his face against Peter's shoulder. "Please," his nephew sighed.

"Just because you ask nicely does not mean I have to agree," Peter sniffed.

Derek stared at Peter for a couple of seconds longer, eyes wide and unsure what any of that meant. "Please?" He repeated once more.

The bed creaked when Laura rolled onto her other side. "Fine," Peter relented. Derek clambered over, messing up the comforter and the blankets as he crawled to the side nearest the wall. Once his nephew was settled, Peter rearranged the blankets over Derek. The bed wasn't really big enough for the both of them, but the four year old barely took up any space. Derek smiled cheekily before rolling onto his stomach and rubbed his face against the pillow.

Peter sighed. He hadn't come home from college to be stuck next to all the children. He would've liked to be sleeping in his own bed, in his own room, but his older cousin _just had_ to get married and have a baby, meaning it would be rude if Peter didn't offer up his room to the happy little family when they came to visit. But now Peter was stuck with all the little kids. It shouldn’t have bothered him, as everyone was sleeping in an odd arrangement, but it still bugged him. Peter wanted peace and quiet, and neither of those things were possible in the Hale household. Derek's breathing evened out, and Peter wondered when the cousin who was originally sharing a bed with Derek would wake up and panic when he realized he was sleeping all alone. In about four hours, Peter guessed, another little kid would stumble into the room and scoot into his space.

Peter pulled the blankets tighter around himself. This is what happened when he ended up being the youngest uncle. Kids just somehow thought they belonged in his space. They were just always there: on his lap, hanging from his shoulders, pulling on his hands to lead him somewhere. Peter just wanted to be left alone, but it was hard to find a moment of peace whenever he came home. He never just had a _minute_ to himself. It was always him in charge of all the kids. He had dealt with the lot of them. Whether newborns, terrible two teethers, sassy little toddlers, precocious adolescents, they all just all somehow became his responsibility the instant he walked in the door.

Peter thought it was unfair. He hadn't asked to be an uncle and he certainly didn't go around getting people pregnant. He was barely nineteen and yet somehow he was forced to take care of all the little new werewolf babies. Christmas just somehow became a thousand times more stressful. If Peter could, he would go back to his dorm room and burrow underneath his own blankets.

Derek snuggled against Peter's back. Sighing, he gave Derek some more access to the blankets, and the toddler rolled away toward the wall. Peter raised an eyebrow. At least Derek stayed on his own side. Laura had the awful habit of kicking her legs into his stomach, and Jessica tended to punch people in the middle of the night. But the girls and Derek were definitely better than the boys. Some of the boys decided they were professional martial artists when they slept, and a couple sleepwalked and sleeptalked. And if he had decided to sleep in the rooms currently taken over by the boys, he would've been held responsible for all their antics.

No, the girls were a lot more manageable. And there were only two of them in this room. Sure it meant having to play teatime with them before bed and consenting to watching whatever movie they chose, but it was an easy job unless Laura wanted to get a little crazy and wage war. Of all the kids, she could turn anything she found into a weapon. It was a bit disconcerting, but as long as she didn't direct the pretend sword/hammer/wand at him, he could let it slide. Anyway, she would most likely grow out of that habit soon enough.

His other nieces and female cousins had decided to overtake the room next door, piling sleeping bags all over the floor and scooting the beds against the walls to make more space, but Peter and his two nieces managed to pull seniority due to the fact that they lived there. He might’ve been stuck in an entirely pink room with nieces and a nephew that barely knew how to control their lycanthropy, but it was far quieter and much nicer.

When Peter woke up in the morning, it was to Johnny climbing into his bed. The whole room glowed pink, and Peter reached up and closed the blinds a little bit more. Sunlight barely peeked inside, but he just needed a few more hours of sleep. Soon the whole house would be buzzing with nervous energy. Peter turned and faced the wall, pulling Derek into his chest and letting Johnny fit snug against the wall. He draped the blankets over both boys and closed his eyes once more. Christmas at the Hale house was not something he personally enjoyed, and the longer he could prolong it, the better.

"Derek's sucking his thumb again," Johnny observed.

Peter opened one eye to check on Derek and appease his other nephew. "Oh well. Just go to sleep."

"You baby him," Johnny huffed as if he was jealous, but he still wrapped an arm around Derek and curled around him. When Johnny settled down, Peter brushed a hand through both of his nephews' hair, hoping beyond hope that they wouldn't remember it was Christmas morning for another few hours.


End file.
